This invention relates to the production of insulated precast concrete walls for residential buildings. Commercial buildings are often built by tilt-up or precast concrete walls that are either not insulated or are insulated on the inside of the concrete after erection of the walls. Residential houses are conventionally built using wood frames with insulation between the wood studs and sheetrock covering the wood. Both of these methods make for an inefficient building in terms of the energy required to keep the building at a comfortable temperature. The increasing price and decreasing quality and availability of lumber has led to an interest in alternative building systems.
Insulating concrete walls on the outside protects them from climatic changes and provides thermal mass to the interior to store heat, thus making the home more energy efficient. This invention is different from other insulated concrete walls that are "sandwich" panels or light weight concrete with insulation imbedded therein. This invention has insulation on the exterior face of the wall with concrete on the interior surface of the wall. Homes built by this invention have been monitored and documented by the U.S. Department of Energy, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden Colo. They were found to perform 85% better than ASHRAE standards.
This is the only method of home building where not only the exterior walls are concrete, but the interior partition walls between the rooms are also precast concrete. Producing the insulated exterior and uninsulated interior wall panels on two casting beds and then cutting the poured wall into individual wall panels saves on material and labor over when individual walls are formed and poured.